Nigeria’s Ebola patient believed to have contracted virus in Uganda, says Switzerland

The Swiss government says the Ebola patient in Nigeria is the Ugandan-born wife of a Switzerland diplomat who is based in Abuja.

 

In a statement to Reuters on Thursday, Switzerland’s Federal Department of Foreign Affairs said the woman was believed to have contracted the virus during a trip to Uganda.

 

The department said the woman had been receiving treatment at a private clinic in Abuja for about a week after developing symptoms.

 

“She is believed to have contracted the virus whilst travelling to Uganda around two weeks ago,” the statement reads.

 

 

The Swiss government said the woman’s husband, who travelled with her, was in isolation but had not shown any symptoms.

 

Nigeria confirmed its first case of Ebola Bundibugyo disease on Tuesday after laboratory tests detected the virus in a woman who had recently arrived in the country.

 

Jean Kaseya, director-general of the Africa Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), said the woman was born in Uganda and had travelled there before returning to Abuja with her husband on October 3.

 

 

Kaseya said health authorities were investigating whether the woman had also travelled to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), had contact with anyone from the country, or visited areas outside Kampala, Uganda.

 

Uganda’s health authorities had earlier claimed the woman was Nigerian and had travelled to eastern DRC for business before transiting through Uganda in early October.

 

Charles Olaro, Uganda’s director-general of health services, said the woman did not develop symptoms while in the country but became ill after arriving in Nigeria.

 

Olaro said travelling through Uganda did not establish that the woman contracted the virus there, adding that the location of exposure remains under investigation.

 

 

Alan Kasujja, Uganda’s government spokesperson, also told Reuters on Thursday that the country had no confirmed Ebola cases.

 

“If we did, as has happened before, we’d be the first to say,” he said.

 

Meanwhile, a senior Kenyan health official said authorities had traced all 135 contacts of the country’s first Ebola case, which was confirmed on October 6. Eight additional cases have since been reported.

 

Patrick Amoth, director-general of Kenya’s health ministry, said the last contact traced was a Ugandan citizen who arrived in Kenya in early October on the same flight as the index patient but later left by road through the Namanga border post with Tanzania.

 

 

Amoth said the individual took longer to locate because he had exited Kenya by road.

 

According to Reuters, the Africa CDC is investigating whether Kenya’s index patient may have come into contact with the woman being treated in Nigeria, as both travelled from Uganda’s Entebbe airport on the same day.

 

Mankoula, an Africa CDC official, said transmission between the two travellers was one of the possible scenarios under investigation.

 

Ebola spreads through direct contact with the bodily fluids of infected people, whether living or dead. Symptoms include fever, vomiting and diarrhoea, while severe cases may involve internal and external bleeding.

 

The Bundibugyo is a rare specie of Ebola virus. There is no approved vaccine or specific treatment for the disease, although supportive medical care can improve patients’ chances of survival.